08 August 2008

Although. Does ‘unpaid internship that will eventually lead to casual hourly employment that MIGHT eventually lead to contracted fulltime work’ actually count as a job?

Blane assures me this is a fairly typical way of finding employment in America. However, I have an inkling in my your-rights-at-work-are-worth-fighting-for bones that I’m being ripped.

I come from a land where ‘unpaid training’ is ILLEGAL.

I come from parents that drive around in cars with ‘MUA HERE TO STAY’ stickers on their bumpers.

I come from a sharehouse where I used to live with a union rep. (Hi Mars!).

Seems to me like ‘land of the free’ translates into the ‘land of the free labour’. And if you aren’t lucky enough to have the support of someone who’ll essentially KEEP you while you dilly around with unpaid internships… well, you can just go work in the ‘land of the minimum wage’. And stay there!

Dot and Mars met at high school in Melbourne. Mars didn't like Dot that much, however eventually they got chatting in chathouse.com during IT classes and found they had heaps in common.

After high school Dot and Mars upgraded to ICQ, Messenger and emailing. This kept them in touch until eventually in 2005 they moved in together and started a blog; 'Dot and Mars: Two Housemates, One House, One Blog'.

In 2007 Dot got married and moved to New York City San Francisco to seek her dream job. At the same time Mars moved to Manchester Melbourne to seek her dream man.